Saturday, July 12, 2008

Karate Lesson #2

Today, I learned that:

- I am remarkably uncoordinated.
- It is surprisingly hard to step with your right foot and punch with your left, and then step with your left foot and punch with your right--over and over again, in quick succession. For me, it proved to be a little like that old "rub your belly and pat your head" trick.
- When you're just learning karate and you're watching and working with people who have been doing this for 5, 10, even 15 years, you feel like a straight-up jackass.
- Although I suck at punching the air, if you put one of those workout bags in front of me, I can actually pack some heat. No, seriously.
- I'm actually picking up the kicks pretty quickly (thanks to Tae Bo, I think), and I have the "back kick of a mule" (her words)--again, not sure if that's a compliment or not. =-)

Overall, even though *I* feel like I'm hopeless, she said that I'm doing quite well for a beginner, and that there are certain things I've already nailed (like the kicks, the c-step) that take some people a good couple of months. The punches, however (and there are SEVERAL, all increasingly more complicated), will take me a while.

I'm SO EXCITED.

4 comments:

Renee said...

I'm cracking UP because I've got the visual in my head of Brent's class of 5-8 year-olds trying to master the step-with-left, punch- with-right move. It was HILARIOUS. It took most of them the whole hour to be able to do, and by the following week, they'd forgotten again.

It's so cool that you're doing this for yourself! And again, I'm very proud of you :-)

Jen said...

I've been practicing; I'm getting better at that but now it's the block with the left (when hand goes down diagnally from waist), punch with the right (and vice versa) that's stumping me a bit.

I swear to God, if I recorded myself in class and stuck it on youtube, I'd be an instant freakin' celebrity.

I'll get it, though. It's one of those things now that I'm determined to do, just cuz it's starting to piss me off that I can't. (Not just that move--I mean karate in general.)

Anonymous said...

Hard. That's why I'm practicing sitting on my ass while moving only my thumb on the remote control ;)

Hey, just a thought - Is this ok with your recently broken elbow?

Jen said...

I don't know. I'll ask my bone doc when I go in on Wednesday and he gives me the final okay to take off the sling for good.

*Snicker*